Ventilator-associated pneumonia: comparing cadaveric liver transplant and non-transplant surgical patients.

VENTILATOR-ASSOCIATED PNEUMONIA: COMPARING CADAVERIC LIVER TRANSPLANT AND NON-TRANSPLANT SURGICAL PATIENTS. Acta Clin Croat. 2016 09;55(3):360-9 Authors: Brusich KT, Acan I, Filipčić NV Abstract Ventilator-associated pneumonia is a frequent complication in intensive care surgical patients, particularly those with high severity scores on admission. We studied the incidence and clinical outcome of ventilator-associated pneumonia among patients undergoing major general surgery procedures and those undergoing cadaveric liver transplantation in our hospital. Patients with the intensive care unit stay longer than four days having undergone surgery or transplantation and mechanically ventilated for more than 48 hours were included in the study. Ventilator-associated pneumonia diagnosis was based on a combination of radiological signs (progressive infiltrate on chest radiograph), clinical signs (fever >38.3 °C, leukocytes >12×10(9)/mL) and microbiological data (positive culture from tracheal aspiration >10(5) or bronchoalveolar lavage >104 colonies/mL). Medical records of 1037 patients were reviewed and 157 patients were found to have been mechanically ventilated for more than 48 hours: 62 transplanted and 95 non-transplanted. Only 39 (24.84%) patients matched the criteria for ventilator-associated pneumonia. There were no differences in sex, age, duration of mechanical ventilation, length of stay or outcome between the two g...
Source: Acta Clinica Croatica - Category: General Medicine Tags: Acta Clin Croat Source Type: research